Colin Cotterill - The Woman Who Wouldn't die

‘And could she tell you anything?’ asked Phosy.

‘A lot. She really could talk to ghosts. I guess that’s what she was doing for the strangers too.’

‘Strangers?’

‘We started to get visitors,’ said the headman. ‘They’d get off the bus or walk in or arrive on motorcycles, like you. They’d stay for an hour or so then leave. But they wouldn’t tell us what they’d been doing.’

‘Was there anybody with her up in the house?’ Dtui asked, remembering the note on the back of Madame Daeng’s photos about the mute brother.

‘I don’t recall seeing anyone,’ said the headman. ‘But then again, the live-in girl was long gone before the second killing and none of us went up there. There could have been someone. Could have been a whole coven of witches for all we know.’

‘I never saw nobody when I went up there,’ said the skinny girl.

‘Were there any major differences between Madame Peung and your Madame Keui?’ Dtui asked.

‘The voice was the same, but there was the accent,’ said the old lady. ‘You can’t hide a Vietnamese accent. The district shaman said it was very likely she picked it up in limbo. Lot of Vietnamese stuck in limbo, he says.’

‘Did your shaman have any other comments?’ asked Dtui.

‘He did mention that we might have been the victims of mass hysteria,’ said the lei-threader. ‘That we’d all inhaled some natural gas escaping from the earth or listened to some demon music and … imagined the first murder.’

‘What do you think?’

‘It was her,’ said the old lady. ‘No question. The live-in girl had spent all that time in the house with her. She was in no doubt. It was the same woman.’

‘And where’s the live-in girl now?’ asked Phosy.

‘Long gone,’ said the skinny girl. ‘Probably still running if I know her.’

On the journey back to Vientiane Dtui and Phosy had gone over the story looking for logical, non-supernatural explanations for what had happened. In his pocket, Phosy had the bullet the headman had gouged out of the front post. That was real enough. Their suggestions were even more far-fetched than the events themselves. But, short of the entire village stringing them along in an elaborate joke, there was no explanation. It jarred every joint, nipped at every nerve in his policeman’s body, but Phosy was forced to agree with the remote likelihood that Madame Keui was indeed a born-again medium. It was not an admission he’d be sharing with anyone at police headquarters. And, besides, there were still a number of smaller questions pending that begged an explanation. He often found that pulling on a loose end unravelled the whole story. But, for the meanwhile, the note Dtui and Phosy would be sending upriver with the next boat would be to the effect that, although their investigation had discovered layer upon layer of mystery, they had uncovered no obvious deceit. As far as they could tell, and as bizarre as it sounded, Madame Peung, aka Madame Keui, was everything she claimed to be. As it turned out, it was a note that would never be sent.

The Vespa pulled up in front of the police dormitory where a small throng of uniformed policemen stood. Upon seeing Phosy they hurried over to him. They were supposed to salute a senior officer, even if he was wearing Bermuda shorts and a nylon jacket. They’d had training courses on police etiquette. But this was often forgotten, especially during moments of urgency.

‘Brother,’ said Sergeant Sihot. He was solid as a tank and permanently dishevelled. ‘There’s been a crime committed. Two, if you count them separately.’

‘Sihot, can you not call me brother in front of the men?’

‘What?’

‘The training?’

‘Oh, right. But, someone’s torched Madame Daeng’s noodle shop.’

‘What?’ shouted Phosy and Dtui at the same time. They were too shocked to dismount.

‘It and the buildings either side of it are gutted.’

‘What makes you think it was torched?’ Phosy asked.

‘Strong stink of petrol in the upstairs rooms,’ said Sihot. ‘And, look, Brother Phosy, I … I don’t suppose you know where Dr Siri and Madame Daeng are right now, do you?’

‘They’re off in Pak Lai,’ said Dtui.

‘Oh, well. That’s a relief.’

He turned to smile at his men. They all seemed suddenly delighted that Daeng’s shop had been burned to the ground.

‘How could that be a relief?’ Phosy asked.

‘Because there’s a body in there.’

It wouldn’t officially go on record as Nurse Dtui’s first solo autopsy. Judge Haeng had reluctantly given the go-ahead but there would be no permission slip with his signature on it. If anything went wrong he would know nothing about it. That was good enough for Phosy.

After an idle month, the morgue smelled … well, like a morgue. Opening the doors and windows did nothing to remove the musty stench. Turning on the light in the late evening succeeded only in filling the place with flying beetles the size of pecan nuts and a cloud of mosquitoes. Only the corpse would escape this onslaught as it had no blood to suck. It had arrived in a large tote bag and been poured on to the cutting room table with the sound of mah-jong tiles. The bones were black. The few that had still been connected at the site were now separated. It was more a puzzle than an autopsy.

‘What do you need to know?’ Dtui asked. She wore a fresh, green operating theatre robe that reached her feet. Four hundred of them were stacked in the corner, donations from the Soviet Union. There were a matching number of masks and twice as many little rubber boots but she hadn’t bothered with them.

‘Who he or she is,’ said Phosy.

Dtui leaned over the pile of bones and poked around with a pencil.

‘Oh, well. We’re in luck,’ she said. ‘Look at this.’

Phosy leaned in to look.

‘What is it?’

‘It’s his name card. It miraculously survived the fire.’

‘All right. Then just tell me whatever you can.’

‘That’s more like it.’

While she was shuffling the parts around she came across the pelvis.

‘I’m quite good at the easy parts,’ she said. ‘And this is one pelvis that was never designed to give birth. And this little fellow over here is probably an eye ridge. All of which tells me our friend here, is … or was, male.’

One femur was intact. She measured it. She hmmed.

‘I was about to suggest it was a child,’ she said. ‘He’s short. But there’s a lot of wear and tear on these joints. And look, the sternum end of the clavicle is fused. So our man here was over thirty. There’s a lot of pitting on the rib so he might even have been over forty. So it’s a short, middle-aged man.’

‘Good job, Dr Dtui,’ said Phosy. ‘Anything else?’

She liked that title. With a broad smile on her face she swatted a menagerie of flying beasts away from the standard lamp and swung its arm over the bone pile. She picked out fragments of the skull and started to put them together. It was particularly difficult. But after ten minutes of shuffling she looked at her husband.

‘I don’t think he was killed by the fire,’ she said.

‘You don’t?’

‘Well, to be certain we’d have to look at his lungs. As his lungs are deep-fried and indistinguishable from his kneecaps, we’ll never know. But I’m prepared to stake my reputation on it. And don’t say I don’t have one.’

‘OK, let’s hear it.’

‘If he died in the fire I can’t think of any reason why anyone would wait until the charred building was cool enough to clamber up to the second floor with no wooden staircase and beat the living daylights out of a corpse.’

‘He’s been hit?’